Anna Wintour just keeps spending more and more money on the annual Met Ball. And the Met Ball numbers are trending down.

The Met Ball, of course, is supposed to be a big fundraiser for the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Once a year they let Wintour invite in the Kardashians and various fashion world people to make a spectacle of themselves on the red carpet. Wintour rules the Met Ball from her Iron Throne. This year’s Ball takes place on May 6th. The theme is “Notes on Camp.” Not Notes from camp, like in the Berkshires. But it would be funny if people dressed that away.

For the 2017 ball, the theme was “Rei Kawakubo/Comme des Garçons.” This is the last Met Ball for which numbers are available, and they took in a total of $12.2 million. That was significantly down from 2016, when the total was 13.5 million. It was more in the neighborhood of 2015, when the total was $12.6 million.

The Met Ball sits on the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s gross total for all fundraisers like a heavy weight. Overall, the Met lost $4.9 million on its fundraisers when you factor in the Met Ball. The previous year the loss $4.7 million. and and in 2015 it was $4.5 million. It also costs a lot more. The 2017 Met Ball had direct expenses of $3.9 million, which means food, travel, etc that wasn’t donated but charged to the Museum. That’s pretty Ball-sy.

The contributions to the Museum via the Met Ball are down as well. In 2016 they were $13.371 million. In 2017, they fell to $11.8 million. There are no available numbers yet for last year’s Ball.

It will be interesting to see if Wintour, who cannot be reined in, will cut costs this year.

Author

Roger Friedman began his Showbiz411 column in April 2009 after 10 years with Fox News. He writes for Parade magazine and has written for Details, Vogue, the New York Times, Post, and Daily News and many other publications. He is the writer and co-producer of "Only the Strong Survive," a selection of the Cannes, Sundance, and Telluride Film festivals.